Making leaps together at ATW2024: an interview with Ry Leahy
In the run-up to Advanced Therapies Week 2024 (16-19 January; Miami, Florida), we caught up with Phacilitate’s Vice President of Research, Ry Leahy, to learn more about the agenda and what we can look forward to. Ry gives us an insight into the standout tracks, how this year’s event is different from the last and the highlights we should look out for.
Please introduce yourself and tell us a little about your role at Phacilitate.
I’m Ry and I am the principal curator for the Advanced Therapies Week agenda. We do year-round research on the cell and gene therapy industry with our advisory board, targeted interviews with industry and academic experts and wide-ranging reviews of the field – and build the massive ATW agenda off the back of these insights. As well as my involvement with the agendas for the Phacilitate meetings, I also currently host the Decentralized Manufacturing Working Group.
2024 marks the 20th anniversary of Advanced Therapies Week. How has the conference and Phacilitate evolved over the years?
ATW has been through a variety of iterations over the years – and even this year’s agenda is wildly different from the last! We’ve notably tried to innovate on the ‘conference’ experience and ensure this is not only an educational, collaborative event where you will network with decision-makers and industry leaders and where deals get done, but also as streamlined and enjoyable for attendees as possible. There’s always room for the unexpected, too…
How did you choose the tracks for this year’s event?
We look to cover the major bottlenecks and challenges in cell and gene therapy in as comprehensive a way as possible in the short time we have. This is based on the inferences from key industry leaders and experts doing groundwork for advanced therapies to be a success. Major tracks include Commercialization, which looks to address biotech business strategy, investment and market access, Patient Considerations, which highlights patient stories and getting treatments to patients, and our supply chain track, bringing down CoGs and shortening the time-to-patient with collaboration and new digital technologies.
The new standouts for the 2024 meeting are the split of cell and gene therapy manufacturing tracks (cell therapy manufacturing and gene therapy manufacturing, respectively) to comprehensively cover the challenges of various modalities without diluting the subject matter and our Innovation Showcase/Tech Demo stages, which highlight breakthrough biotech and the latest start-ups in cell and gene therapy.
The agenda features fewer vendor presentations than in previous years. What is the influence of this on the content we will see overall?
This is a continual work in progress for us, but something I specifically care a lot about. When talking about the major bottlenecks and how to solve them, our audience does not want to see a company give a pitch; nobody wants to see a pure-play capabilities slide deck. If a vendor is involved in our program, they have to work on addressing the challenges for therapeutic developers and the topics of the session they are assigned. More recently, vendors and CDMOs have been given the option of taking part in a ‘Fireside Chat’ – a 1-to-1 with the session chairperson – for a more dynamic, conversational and solutions-focused dialogue with an experienced industry leader.
Is there a specific session you are most looking forward to?
Ouch! That one always hurts. It is very difficult to choose, as this agenda is packed and there isn’t a single session I wouldn’t want to see. As I host the Decentralized Manufacturing Working Group, I’m glad to see so many sessions that talk directly to the state of and the future of decentralized, distributed and point/place of care manufacturing – I’m also particularly excited for the highest level of FDA involvement we’ve had at Phacilitate.
What is the main message you would like attendees to take away from the conference?
I want attendees to walk away with the solution to their problem, be it a new idea, a new partner, or a new technology that changes the game for developing the therapies of the future. The core goal of Phacilitate is to progress cell and gene therapy as the next pillar of medicine and to move the goalpost on getting effective and safe treatments to patients quicker. The key tenet of this is collaboration, collaboration, collaboration. This industry only survives and patients with unmet need only get treated if we make the necessary leaps, and we can only do that together!